The Ryan Family Businesses

Ryan's great-grandpa started an earthmoving business for the railroads in 1884:

Ryan Incorporated Central has been shaping the earth since 1884. The Company started in Janesville, Wisconsin with a team of mules building railroad embankment in Southern Wisconsin and Northern Illinois....

1884: Patrick W. Ryan was the son of James Ryan, an Irish immigrant... made their living by farming and renting horses and slip scrapers to the railroads.... P.W. Ryan an independent contractor....with the railroads as they built new lines in their expansion to the west...

William H. Ryan, a 1908 graduate of the University of Wisconsin, went to work as an engineer for a railroad... he contracted with the railroad for a roundhouse in South Dakota and began his lifelong contracting career...P.W. Ryan Sons soon became one of the largest grading and crushing contractors in the State of Wisconsin and Northern Illinois...

William J. Ryan, Thomas M. Ryan, and Donald P. Ryan...(sons of) William H. Ryan, began operations as Wisconsin highway grading contractors. Soon after, they expanded to other states and during the height of the Interstate and Toll Road construction era had offices in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, and West Virginia... Ryan Incorporated of Wisconsin became one of the top five site developers in the country.

By the 1940's the Company had become a full-service grading contractor serving both private industrial and public transportation customers, including some of the original work at what would become O'Hare Airport.... Ryan expanded its services to include landfill construction and waste remediation, and in the 1990's added golf course construction. Today, Ryan Incorporated Central is one of the nation's premier mass excavation and site-work contractors... project size...$10,000 to $50,000,000... in over 25 states.

1985 the three principals of Ryan Incorporated Wisconsin had 20 children ... The children of William J. Ryan took over the Florida operation, and their cousins took over the Chicago and Wisconsin offices...Since 1985 and the eventual consolidation of entities into The Ryan Companies, the organization has had offices in...Florida...Virginia....Colorado....Illinois.

3. Rep. Paul Ryan's uncle is Mike Barnicle's doctor

It is indeed a small world, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and MSNBC's Mike Barnicle found out today.

Ryan appeared on Morning Joe to plug Republicans' healthcare reform package, when Barnicle decided to grill him on the details of the legislation. Soon enough, the conversation revealed that Ryan's uncle is Barnicle's cardiologist.

BARNICLE: Let's pretend that your bill is enacted, passed and signed into law, and it's a year from now. And I'm going for a stress test at the Massachusetts General Hospital.

So, A, do I get to choose my own doctor? Tell me how much it's going to cost for this stress test in terms of a percentage basis, compared to now. And how much is it going to take out of my wallet to pay for your health care plan?

RYAN: Well, if you go to Mass General, I hope you pick my uncle, because he's a cardiologist there at Mass General.